Portsmouth have asked the Premier League to allow the manager, Avram Grant, to make loan and free-transfer signings while the club clears its footballing debts. Photograph: Alex Morton/Action Images

Portsmouth will have to wait at least another day to discover if their player registration embargo is to be lifted after the Premier League continued to consider the financial information supplied by the club during the two sides' meeting yesterday.

The league's bottom team owe £10m to various English clubs for missed transfer instalments. A £7m payment of television money is now due from the Premier League, and it seems almost certain that it will choose to pay this directly to those football creditors.

If Portsmouth cannot make up the £3m shortfall to clear the debt, various options are available to the league. It is thought that one Portsmouth may have asked it to explore is to allow Avram Grant the opportunity of completing free-transfer and loan deals until the £3m is cleared.

The league is thought to be losing patience with the club, so it is not clear how amenable it would be to shifting away from the blanket ban it imposed in mid-October, to allow Grant some leeway to sign new players during the current transfer window.

The Premier League may simply decide to maintain the embargo but it will also be conscious that Grant was able to name only 17 players for Tuesday's FA Cup third-round replay at Coventry City, one short of a full squad. While Grant's team offered a spirited display to force extra-time through a late equaliser, before claiming a last-gasp victory through Aaron Mokoena's winner, the Israeli desperately requires new faces.

Grant's lack of playing options is limiting his tactical options, ahead of Saturday's visit to the south coast of Birmingham City, who are unbeaten in 13. Grant, though, was happy with the contribution of Mokoena, whom he was forced to field in central defence against Coventry. "I think Mokoena was great," he said. "Firstly he was playing in a position that was not his familiar one, but we needed him. Mokoena is one of the most ­professional players I have ever met."